I went to Costco yesterday and came home with three loaves of sweet bread (pumpkin bread, pound "cake," and what was supposed to be caramel pecan and ended up having not caramel and a lot of chocolate). At any rate, I needed to put these away and that's what leads to this whole post.
First, a bit of explanation. I long ago discovered that freezing something was a great idea but the major problem was portion control. If I froze a pound a ground beef in a package I invariably want 1.5 pounds or just enough for one burger for me. Thus, I started making single patties of uniform size and then I could take out as many as I wanted for whatever I was making. The challenge arose in how to package these much smaller portions in a way that wouldn't cause me to stay awake nights thinking about the amount of plastic I had used to accomplish that.
Then there was the bacon I wanted to freeze in single slices so I could, again, choose how many slices I wanted to use at one time.
And yet again the situation arose when I wanted to freeze individual oatmeal raisin cookies (the soft kind that are a bit sticky on the outside).
I solved the problem by utilizing a product we're all been told not to use any more--the dreaded plastic grocery bag. We'll get to how I use them in a minute. First, however, is dealing with the question of why in the world I would have any of them in my house anyway. Well, there are a couple of reasons for that. First of all, I have literally dozens of them (more than likely the number exceeds 100) from the days when I didn't really pay much attention to such things. The other one is a bit more complex. Yes, I can (and do) carry canvas bags for groceries but I don't always remember to put them back in the car immediately and then I'm caught bagless at the store. I can get paper bags at the grocery store but I've found there are any number of stores that are less environmentally conscious and have no substitute. Thus, no matter my environmentally friendly stance, I still have them in copious numbers in my house and if I have them there, I will definitely reuse them rather than simply throwing them away.
In the past I have used the whole bags. Actually, I could do a whole post on all those uses but today I'll limit myself to using less than the whole bag. I'm not certain when I thought of this but I find myself using it more and more frequently. I cut the handles and bottom seam off the bag, cut it up one side and I now have a surprisingly large piece of plastic.
I cut that into smaller pieces which can then be used to wrap individual portions of something prior to putting them in a larger container to put in the freezer. I have no idea why I didn't think of it before but I'm certainly glad I thought of it now. It's probably not saving me much money but it makes me feel better to find a use for those bags that also cuts down on the use of other purchased wraps.
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